All cuts are now complete, just a bit of soil to go yet. We have completed the cuts for both the house and for landscaping at the back of the site. Next week we will be commencing preparation work (post holes) for retaining walls.
DAY 1 - Site Scrape Begins and Selections Day
It all begins with DAY 1 - the site scrape. It has been a long journey and a stressful one at that. You may be asking why and how we have day 1 on the same day as selections...
This is because we are taking a pretty massive risk. Our site works contractor needed to complete our job by March, so we begged and pleaded with council to let us do site works and NOTHING else before we got full development approval. The risk being that there is still a very SLIM chance that there will be a request for a bench level to be altered. If this happens, we will have to foot the bill to correct it and that will not be cheap. On the other hand, we have saved a bucket load of money by doing site works and soil removal externally. It was a risk we are willing to take.
Selections went well, completed in 3 hours. We had a good idea what we wanted to do, but there was one other group of 4 people (what the???) doing their selections at the same time. Their servers were also down so we had to do a manual selection process instead of computer. Basically we were upgrading with not much idea of cost, so it will be interesting to see the outcome. Only drama we had, which isn't too big was the roof material. We changed our mind from last plans to go Colorbond instead of Tiles, however today we found out that it would take about an extra month as the plans and estimation needed to be modified AND it would have to go back through council. This was not an option as that increased our risk of a bench level change, so we conceded defeat and went tiles.
So the excitement is finally here and it is great to finally see some action on our block! Below are the pictures of the progress made on Day 1.
This is because we are taking a pretty massive risk. Our site works contractor needed to complete our job by March, so we begged and pleaded with council to let us do site works and NOTHING else before we got full development approval. The risk being that there is still a very SLIM chance that there will be a request for a bench level to be altered. If this happens, we will have to foot the bill to correct it and that will not be cheap. On the other hand, we have saved a bucket load of money by doing site works and soil removal externally. It was a risk we are willing to take.
Selections went well, completed in 3 hours. We had a good idea what we wanted to do, but there was one other group of 4 people (what the???) doing their selections at the same time. Their servers were also down so we had to do a manual selection process instead of computer. Basically we were upgrading with not much idea of cost, so it will be interesting to see the outcome. Only drama we had, which isn't too big was the roof material. We changed our mind from last plans to go Colorbond instead of Tiles, however today we found out that it would take about an extra month as the plans and estimation needed to be modified AND it would have to go back through council. This was not an option as that increased our risk of a bench level change, so we conceded defeat and went tiles.
So the excitement is finally here and it is great to finally see some action on our block! Below are the pictures of the progress made on Day 1.
Site Works Beginning TOMORROW!
Well... After what feels like an eternity of paperwork and phone calls, we decided that we would go ahead with completing our site works externally to Homestead. We received a phone call today from our Earthworks Contractor stating that he would like to commence the work tomorrow.
Let the fun begin! 7 months on from our first signing and we are finally here. It has felt like an eternity, but now we are at this stage, it feels somewhat sudden.
The following picture is of our block of land, the day before work begins...
Let the fun begin! 7 months on from our first signing and we are finally here. It has felt like an eternity, but now we are at this stage, it feels somewhat sudden.
The following picture is of our block of land, the day before work begins...
1st Part Of Council Approval and Selections Time!
This week on Monday 14th Feb we received a letter from Council informing us that our plans have been approved through planning assessment.
We then had a phone call from Homestead on Wednesday 16th of Feb to arrange a time to go into head office for selections. So we are all booked in for Monday 21st Feb.
To Essa Stone or not to Essa Stone, that is the question...
We then had a phone call from Homestead on Wednesday 16th of Feb to arrange a time to go into head office for selections. So we are all booked in for Monday 21st Feb.
To Essa Stone or not to Essa Stone, that is the question...
It's Been A While
Well it has now been two months since our last post... Been a bit slack with updates over the Christmas/New Year period. Here is the list of what has happened:
Friday 17th December - Received approval from encumbrances (land developers) and were informed by Homestead that everything was sent off to council. We also met with the Bank to start the ball rolling for approval, which at this stage we are hearing that it has been approved.
Tuesday 21st December - Rang Council to check that our application was received, which it was and we were told a rough time of 7 weeks until approval.
Wednesday 5th January - Went to Beaumont Tiles for our selections, which are as follows
Bathroom & Laundry Walls - Obelis Sand Gloss 300x600
Bathroom & Laundry Floors - Obelis Sand Semi-Gloss 300x300
Both of the above are with Travertine Grout
Kitchen - Mosaic Spectrum Black Pin Wall 100x100 with white grout
Porch Areas - Habitat Charcoal CB-Porc Textured 297x297 with charcoal grout
At this stage we have only opted for the standard wall heights for tiling due to the high upgrade costs, but we are really hoping that we can go for floor to ceiling tiling in the bathroom areas.
Thursday 6th January - We went to Austral Bricks for selections, which are as follows
Brick Upgrade to the entire house - Governors Range - King
Roof - Colorbond - Monument
Facias - Paperbark
Gutter - Monument
Windows - Paperbark
Panel Door - Monument
We are also investigating private site works. Reason being that we have at least 718t of spoil to remove from site. We have a contractor that can take our dirt with no dump fee, so we would like to use him for our site works as well. This will be much easier than trying to coincide site works with soil removal on the same day but with 2 different contractors.
Will keep updating our blog more promptly from now on so there isn't as much to read.
Friday 17th December - Received approval from encumbrances (land developers) and were informed by Homestead that everything was sent off to council. We also met with the Bank to start the ball rolling for approval, which at this stage we are hearing that it has been approved.
Tuesday 21st December - Rang Council to check that our application was received, which it was and we were told a rough time of 7 weeks until approval.
Wednesday 5th January - Went to Beaumont Tiles for our selections, which are as follows
Bathroom & Laundry Walls - Obelis Sand Gloss 300x600
Bathroom & Laundry Floors - Obelis Sand Semi-Gloss 300x300
Both of the above are with Travertine Grout
Kitchen - Mosaic Spectrum Black Pin Wall 100x100 with white grout
Porch Areas - Habitat Charcoal CB-Porc Textured 297x297 with charcoal grout
At this stage we have only opted for the standard wall heights for tiling due to the high upgrade costs, but we are really hoping that we can go for floor to ceiling tiling in the bathroom areas.
Thursday 6th January - We went to Austral Bricks for selections, which are as follows
Brick Upgrade to the entire house - Governors Range - King
Roof - Colorbond - Monument
Facias - Paperbark
Gutter - Monument
Windows - Paperbark
Panel Door - Monument
We are also investigating private site works. Reason being that we have at least 718t of spoil to remove from site. We have a contractor that can take our dirt with no dump fee, so we would like to use him for our site works as well. This will be much easier than trying to coincide site works with soil removal on the same day but with 2 different contractors.
Will keep updating our blog more promptly from now on so there isn't as much to read.
Contract Signed
So last Friday (19-11-2010) we went into Homestead Head Office to finally sign our contract! So we should hopefully have our bank pack within about 2 weeks. We are at this stage hoping to get into council before Christmas... Fingers crossed...
YELLOWS!
Well today (16-11-2010) we received a copy of our yellows! (See below)
We had a few extra changes that we made last week, robe provision to bedroom 2 moved, stairs to garage moved (wouldn't have been able to fit a big car in) and the front entrance door modified to a pivot door.
Tomorrow we are booked in to sign the building contract at 1pm! Can't wait!
We had a few extra changes that we made last week, robe provision to bedroom 2 moved, stairs to garage moved (wouldn't have been able to fit a big car in) and the front entrance door modified to a pivot door.
Tomorrow we are booked in to sign the building contract at 1pm! Can't wait!
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